Over the last few years, there has been a lot of talk about the democratization of investing. Commission-free trading and online access have been the major drivers of narrowing the gap between traders on Wall Street and Main Street for sure, but there is another way in which individuals have caught up with institutions: Retail investors now frequently use strategies and techniques that were, until relatively recently, exclusively used by desk traders in dealing rooms. One of those is to treat volatility as an asset class, something which has become a bit of a catchphrase amongst some financial advisors of late. It sounds good, but is it really a good idea for individual investors?

在过去的几年里，有很多关于投资民主化的讨论。毫无疑问，免佣金交易和在线交易一直是缩小华尔街和普通华尔街交易员之间差距的主要动力，但还有另一种方式让个人赶上了机构:散户投资者现在经常使用的策略和技术，直到最近还只有交易室内的交易员才会使用。其中之一是将波动视为一种资产类别，这在一些金融顾问中已经成为了一个口号。这听起来不错，但对个人投资者来说真的是个好主意吗?

Before going any further, I should probably clarify what I mean by "volatility."

在进一步讨论之前，我可能应该澄清我所说的“波动性”是什么意思。

Volatility is when a market flies around, with big swings each day and over periods of time. These days, though, there are instruments available that are priced based primarily on the level of volatility. They go up when the market starts to jump around with significant drops and big swings, so holders of them make money when volatility is high and lose when it is low. That makes them tradeable instruments, like stocks, bonds, commodities, and other asset classes, so, in theory, volatility itself can now be seen as an asset class.

波动性是指市场的波动，每天都有很大的波动，并且持续一段时间。不过，目前有一些工具主要是根据波动性来定价的。当市场开始大幅下跌和大幅波动时，它们就会上涨，因此，当波动性高时，它们的持有者就会赚钱，当波动性低时就会亏损。这使得波动率成为可交易的工具，就像股票、债券、大宗商品和其他资产类别一样，因此，理论上，波动率本身现在可以被视为一种资产类别。

I should also note quickly the difference between investors and traders -- the oversimplified definition here is that investors are in it for the long-term, while traders take advantage of short-term moves.

我还应该迅速指出投资者和交易员之间的区别——这里的过度简化定义是，投资者是为了长期投资，而交易员则利用短期波动。

Why does volatility matter, then? For investors, volatility is usually a bad thing. It means that portfolio values move around rapidly, a much harder situation to manage than a gradual upward slope in value or a slow, steady decline. For traders, though, volatility is an opportunity. When prices are moving quickly, there is greater risk, but also greater reward on trades you get right. Traders have treated volatility as an asset class of sorts for a long time, using options, futures, and other instruments to hedge large positions. Now that there are easily tradeable ETFs that make those things available to individuals, it seems to make sense for them to use them too.

那么，波动性为什么重要呢?对投资者来说，波动性通常是一件坏事。这意味着投资组合的价值会快速变动，这比价值的逐渐上升或缓慢、稳定的下降更难管理。不过，对交易员来说，波动性是一个机会。当价格快速波动时，风险会更大，但如果你做对了交易，回报也会更高。长期以来，交易员们一直将波动性视为一种资产类别，利用期权、期货和其他工具来对冲大额头寸。现在有了易于交易的etf，让个人也能获得这些东西，他们使用这些东西似乎也很有意义。

The problem is that volatility instruments were designed for traders and are set up to solve a trading problem, not an investing one. They offer a decent return in extreme circumstances, and they offer no benefit whatsoever to long-term holders. In fact, because the funds that give individual investors access to them are all managed products with associated fees, they are pre-programmed to lose money rather than offer a return over long periods.

问题在于，波动率工具是为交易员设计的，旨在解决交易问题，而不是投资问题。它们在极端情况下提供了体面的回报，但对长期持有者没有任何好处。事实上，因为让个人投资者投资的基金都是管理费管理的产品，它们的程序预设为赔钱，而不是提供长期回报。

Traditional asset classes are the opposite of that. They offer a return over time in some way, shape, or form. Bonds and other fixed income products pay interest, while both stocks and commodities gain, at least in nominal value, within a system where the economy grows with innovation and productivity gains, and where inflation gradually increases prices of raw materials.

传统资产类别正好相反。随着时间的推移，它们会以某种形式提供回报。债券和其他固定收益产品支付利息，而股票和大宗商品都在上涨，至少在名义价值上是这样。在这个体系中，经济会随着创新和生产率的提高而增长，通胀会逐渐推高原材料的价格。

That is not to say that volatility products don’t have a place. I have recommended them several times over the years, but they have very specific, short-term utility. In my view, their principle use for individual investors is psychological.

这并不是说波动性产品没有立足之地。这些年来，我多次推荐它们，但它们具有非常具体的短期效用。在我看来，它们对个人投资者的主要用途是心理上的。

The worst thing you can do as a long-term investor is to give in to pressure applied by short-term volatility and exit long-term positions. Stock in a solid company with good prospects will go down when the market is dropping dramatically, but the price move doesn’t change the fact that it is a solid company with good prospects. Indices may fly around at times, with well-publicized big daily drops but, over long periods, they march inexorably higher.

作为一个长期投资者，你能做的最糟糕的事情就是屈服于短期波动的压力，退出长期头寸。一家前景良好的公司的股票在市场急剧下跌时也会下跌，但价格的变动并不能改变它是一家前景良好的公司的事实。股指有时可能会波动，出现广为人知的大幅下跌，但长期来看，它们会不可阻挡地走高。

So, selling into short-term volatility, then facing the problem of when to buy back in, makes no sense, however your stock portfolio is structured.

因此，无论你的股票投资组合结构如何，在短期波动中卖出股票，然后面临何时回购的问题是没有意义的。

Still, the pressure to do so is enormous when volatility is rampant, and the most effective way of handling that pressure is just to do something. In that situation, buying a volatility instrument such as a VIX tracking ETF like VXX or a leveraged inverse Index ETF such as SPXS allows you to tell yourself that you saw the drop coming and did something. Your portfolio value may be dropping, but you have something that is making money and you are doing better than the index, so it is easier to just wait out what has always proven to be a temporary thing. In this case, fooling yourself is a good thing.

不过，在波动性猖獗的情况下，这样做的压力是巨大的，而应对这种压力的最有效方法就是采取行动。在这种情况下，购买波动性工具，如VIX跟踪ETF (VXX)或杠杆逆指数ETF (SPXS)，可以让你告诉自己，你看到了下跌，并做了些什么。你的投资组合价值可能在下降，但你有一些正在赚钱的东西，而且你的表现比指数表现得更好，因此，等待总是被证明是暂时的事情发生是更容易的。在这种情况下，欺骗自己是一件好事。

The point is that this is a short-term trade that investors can make, with a specific, limited purpose. It is okay to borrow the trading strategies and hedging techniques of traders and hedge funds. We all do it all the time, when we analyze charts and set stop loss levels, for example. However, calling those short-term instruments an asset class implies that they should be a permanent part of your portfolio, and that does not take advantage of them in the way they're designed to be used.

关键是，这是一种投资者可以进行的短期交易，目的是特定的、有限的。可以借用交易员和对冲基金的交易策略和对冲技术。我们一直都在这样做，例如，当我们分析图表和设置止损水平时。然而，将这些短期工具称为一种资产类别，意味着它们应该是你投资组合中永久的一部分，而这并没有按照它们的设计用途来利用它们。

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